Sundfør wishes to pour oil on the choppy waters of a weary world, and the warm clarity of her voice offers beautiful moments of respite.

More than anything Oberhofer's optimistic, melodious pop-rock, all "oohs" and "ooh-e-ooh-e-oohs", takes its cues from the Beach Boys.

His voice may be sounding a teeny bit thin these days (although he still has all the high notes) but if you like Rod Stewart, you will love this album; if not, there are high points which may win you over.

The band are less assured on the quieter numbers, however. The likes of Milk at McDonald’s and the dreamlike Sue’s are pleasant enough (and the former includes the arresting line “I don’t regret a single drop of alcohol”), but unlike their best work there is precious little in the way of nagging hooks to lodge in one’s head.

It’s on less conventional tracks, where his voice gets looped (March) or lost among electronic and orchestral textures (Gabe), that the desolate atmosphere really starts to take hold.

They slip in some elements of skipping French Caribbean zouk on Courage, but power rather than swing is the SJO’s thing, and while they have upped their vocal output here, the right-on slogans don’t take you far.

While the elastic basslines of the Talking Heads-indebted Only in a Man’s World and Money Is a Memory stand out, Making a New World works best as a single piece of music, not least because some of its interstices are too fragile to stand unaided.

At times the music feels less like a tribute to her remarkable legacy than an exercise in smooth, award-ceremony funk.

These 15 tracks find Georgia Hubley often taking the lead on guitar, offering up ambient passages--like Dream Dream Away, a strummed interlude of off-hand beauty--and, on Esportes Casual, a little loungey bossanova that, though sweet, sits ill with the rest of this immersive listen.

Stewart remains a firebrand intent on creating skull-splintering sounds and society-skewering words.

What Praxis Makes Perfect might lack in fresh musical directions--their percolating analogue-digital pop remains little altered--it makes up for in apposite italophile detail.

Though the album is formulaic and polished, there is enough crackle in its dark, lustrous soundscapes and tales of nocturnal romance to intrigue.

Overlong, and sounding a little like a lot of other things, High Anxiety nonetheless reveals an unexpected talent hidden in plain sight.

No one could ever mistake this band for sonic outliers, even when they hit their distortion pedals, but Walking Like We Do sets the Big Moon up for much bigger, more mainstream things.

It’s a shame that the album overstays its welcome a little. As always, the Casady sisters are best in small, surreal doses.

The mood, set by affectless guitars and minor-key piano, varies little over 10 tracks, but even when contemplating homelessness (on the title track) or foundering relationships (Yes, I Helped You Pack), Ejimiwe feels more at ease in his own melancholy.

The appeal of this latest Cohen live offering hinges on a brace of more rarely performed tracks--Joan of Arc as a too-sweet duet with Hattie Webb; the lyrically dense Field Commander Cohen--sweetened by two new songs and two new covers.

Over the course of the album, however, his mannered delivery grates, turning Ken, with two notable exceptions (Tinseltown Swimming in Blood; Saw You at the Hospital), into a twisted strain of cabaret.

Overall, an enjoyable, imaginative and at times uncanny assault on the senses.

What the album lacks is that corona of curious magic their hero Neil Young calls “the spook”. Fortunately, it doesn’t feel like it’s far away.

English Electric acts as a rejoinder to those who think that synth-pop is best left to the young.

These highs could have been more musically vertiginous and the lows more chasmic. It is a privilege to have them back, but you wish their music had the courage of Gossip’s convictions. Don’t Be Afraid is an epic intentionally trapped in a cheap Casio keyboard: underpowered.

Things are less compelling when the tempo drops, as on the undistinguished Rear View Mirror, but this is a welcome return nonetheless.

These 11 songs balance mainstream appeal (Someone I Don’t Know) alongside an intimate sense of being cocooned with someone who has plenty of worth to impart.

Overall, a mixed bag.

There are lapses in quality control (Jen Cloher cover Fear Is Like a Forest is especially leaden) and they’re rather less sure-footed when they cover each other’s songs--or tackle Belly’s Untogether together. Not the triumph it could have been, then.

Next to this shimmering peak ["Clearest Blue"], a few songs pale in comparison.

[I Forget Where We Were] hangs together well, his David Gray/Damien Rice-like vocals resting on a bed of skittering drums, crafty guitar and fedback chords. Individual tracks take their time to get going (only one song here comes in under four minutes) and numbers such as opener Small Things break after two or three minutes to build back up from a pleasant plod to a sustained fug of sound.

Iglooghost’s formerly punishing BPMs give way to atmospheres and tracks – such as Light Gutter, featuring a female vocalist called Lola – that might be mistaken for actual songs.

Although songs such as Things Don’t Change That Fast favourably recall many doleful US barroom bards, voice and words don’t actually improve Nugent, who packs more lyricism in his fingers than most.

Welsh-language band 9Bach’s third album takes simple elements--Lisa Jên’s ethereal vocals, piano, bass and percussion, harp and hammer dulcimer--and weaves complex patterns.

There are some excellent songs here (Hailstones Don’t Hurt’s atmospheric build-up is a fine example of dreamy folk-pop), though at 14 tracks long, the album could be tighter.

Ultimately, it’s a jarring mix, though Tricky has hit upon something interesting with the Unloved-style desert blues of Like a Stone and Vietnam.

Although the likes of the punchy 1981 and the poppier Suzie Chapstick roll back the years, too many of the songs here sound laboured and/or pedestrian, and there’s a real paucity of memorable material.

Crutchfield rides a middle road here. Same producer yet different band; same sprightly Americana vibe yet more emotionally placid than its predecessor, which recounted a troubled reckoning with her newfound sobriety.

Though nothing on this record gives the impression of being overthought, there’s a familiar strangeness to his songwriting too.

If Insano is to be Mescudi’s musical curtain call, it showcases his capacity to attract big names, without delivering on distinctive songs.

The soul vocals of 22-year-old Yorkshire lad John Newman helped send the hit ["Feel The Love"] into anthemic stratospheres. The rest of this debut doesn't quite take off in the same way.

This assured debut is largely about a doomed love affair, a curio you didn’t know you needed until it arrives.

At 11 songs (yes, the title is a trick) and just over 25 minutes, it all makes for a short, sharp, exhilarating blast, closing with the question we’re all asking as things fall apart: What Can You Do But Rock’n’Roll?

On record that passion turns out to be a double-edged sword: his emotive delivery gives spirit to his quieter material, but when he’s at his most strident, on his more anthemic numbers, it can start to feel as if he’s using his voice to beat the listener into submission, as with Get Better here.

It’s not that C5 is too little, too late; more that the baton between the generations passed some time ago.

It’s an intriguing record, unpredictable and weird even in its simplicity.

Flawed, but enjoyable.

Bright Magic feels like a logical next step, with fewer samples, and the likes of Blixa Bargeld, Nina Hoss and Eera much more foregrounded. The downside is that, for all the invention on display here, J Willgoose Esq and Wrigglesworth have lost some of their USP with this shift in focus.

There are inevitable longueurs as well, mind: Pure Poor gives dirges a bad name, and closer Hey Lou Reid fancies itself as an epic but instead just feels like an extraordinarily slow six minutes. Still, the fact that Glasgow Eyes is three-quarters of a good record is reason for celebration.

A certain wooziness has always been the point of the Baltimore duo’s music but at times its gauzy aimlessness drifts dangerously close to torpor. More often, though, it is subtly tethered to some elegant, insidious hooks.

It can be heavy going, most notably on the headache-inducing demented circus polka of Sugar Boats (imagine Tom Waits covering Fucik’s Entry of the Gladiators), and a gateway song such as 2004’s Float On wouldn’t have gone amiss, but this is a solid enough return.

It’s all pleasant enough, but falls some way short of being compelling.

Without the tension created by the jerky guitar riffs of Smith’s day job, too much of the material here, particularly towards the album’s end, drifts by forgettably.

Subtract is palpably a grownup record on which he swings from coping to not coping. ... Artistically, things are less clear cut. If this is not a time for frisky, funky percussion, the watery tropes on these songs are matched by the album’s misty sound.

Inveterate collaborators Dr John and Kairos 4tet also add variety to a somewhat one-paced set.

Those happy to go with Van Etten will be rewarded by swooping pop noir, groaning organs and a sax solo, plus considerable hard-won wisdom.

There are appealing acoustic and woodwind moments--Yellow Lights, Aubade--but the thumping orchestral pieces verge on overkill and the dystopic descriptions of burning barrels seem hysterical at a time of rocketing renewables. Compared to Bellowhead, it’s a damp squib.

There are precious few real surprises, then, but that's not a problem.

He doesn’t sustain the magic, however, with the result that Cautionary Tale is very much a front-loaded affair, the likes of Lightning and Thunder failing to spark.

Knopfler’s music remains a reliable source of warm bluesy guitarwork; the Dire Straits-aping riff of Beryl is a familiar pleasure.

For all the Tarantino growl and spaghetti western shlock of opener Til the Moment of Death, this second album carries itself with more assurance than last year’s eponymous debut, with songcraft and witty wordplay coming to the forefront.

Nearly half its tracks have seen the light of day already, not least the standout Waiting Game. The remainder offer up a more conventional take on the sound than Banks's British counterpart, FKA Twigs.

Pity there's still too much syrup to wade through on other tracks.

A record that settles into a nicely crafted, twinkly retro rut without really grabbing you by anything more vital than your lapels; tweedy, bespoke, second-hand.

A skilfully aerated record in which loneliness, the far east and naff cologne all play a part.

The mood is mostly contemplative, with Khan embellishing songs like the wistful title track with sinuous cello-like parts, while he gets his own devotional outings (Knochentanz, Sufi Song), where Yorkston “just did my best to keep up”.

Though the self-consciousness and perky melodies start to wear thin, there’s depth here too. The best tracks strip away the hipster reference points to examine sadness and low self-esteem with wit and sincerity.

Little sparks surprise and delight, such as producer FaltyDL’s creative use of unpredictable backing vocals, and Anohni’s gossamer hook on French Lessons. On the other hand, Ketamine proffers a disorientating rhythm and queasy vibe – presumably designed to recreate a K trip – that is oddly not that enjoyable to listen to. However, the main problem is a constellation of guests.

Not flawless but always affecting.

While by no means a bad album, this fails to stand out in the way its predecessor did.

Their debut album certainly has its moments... But too many of their songs float prettily by without making an impact, gossamer-light and gossamer-memorable.

His debut album has too much going on.

An album more likely to inspire admiration than love, then, but still smart enough to deserve plenty of it.

A little paunchiness suits the skanking bounce and wobble of their songs and a good time brassiness dominates even on the more meditative tracks.

The drama of Davies’s gothic Broadway stylings can grow suffocating, but her vengeful vision remains compelling.

This album’s default seltzer dynamics are superbly well appointed, but the aim of many of these songs is often occluded by Burton’s knee-jerk tastefulness.

Crystallised, in particular, kicks into a deeply satisfying psych-rock crunch halfway through - a reverb-heavy, robust foil for Prochet's feathery voice. But for much of the unfocused second half of the album, their sounds stray into Stereolab-lite.

It's not only Joel Little's minimalist production, all clicks, bass and empty space. The restraint lies also in Ella Yelich-O'Connor's treatment of orthodox pop themes.

A beguiling decoction of pretty much everything going on in hipster musical circles, sweet and savvy and scary at the same time.

A litany of icy threats, Break That (ft Suspect) doesn’t advance the genre much, but like much of this mixtape it does remind his original fanbase that Octavian is a threat as well as a hedonist street philosopher.

Very little of her pop is dull, even when she is trying to write for lowest common denominator mass appeal. The best tune here by some distance is the maddest.

A special evening, but one containing both chasms and confluences.

Curiously, this bold new direction isn’t sustained; the further into the album Malkmus gets, the more normal service resumes, as if he isn’t entirely convinced of his new direction.

Furler's lyrics do tend more towards generalities than specifics, but there are penetrating looks here at love's mind games (Fair Game), and being saved (Cellophane).

It's hard to tell whether this is Plant teasing, or connecting threads, or both. Whatever the truth, his bloody-minded refusal to countenance that Zeppelin reunion continues to yield beguiling new directions.

Apart from the more contemporary dystopian digitals of Golden, the feel throughout is ancient and enigmatic. But these lute tones and classical Arabic music figures are rendered digitally; the cloister garden is an interior dream-space.

By definition, More Life has sprawl in-built, so judicious use of the skip function is required, but this is high-quality filler.

This is an album for frenziedly colouring outside the lines. But there is calm, too.

A little more of the funk on How We Be might help stem the wafting, but there is loveliness here.

Tomorrow’s Modern Boxes doesn’t match up to In Rainbows--it’s closer in style to 2006’s introspective The Eraser--partly because, delivery method aside, there’s little in the way of surprises.

Hagerty’s guitar playing remains as unkempt as ever, but, touchingly, the duo’s vocals play tag throughout, augmenting one another’s frazzled joint vision as though no time had passed.

It broadly makes for a winning reboot, from the old-skool hip-hop stylings of The Sideshow and the urgency of Nobody Speak, a collaboration with Run the Jewels, to the more menacing atmosphere of Depth Charge and the jazz inflections of Ashes to Oceans. It’s not without its longueurs, however.

Joy fails to replicate the shock of the new and for all its effulgent harmonies, a certain gnarly swagger has been lost.

A handful more tracks and now, the full monty, reveals that there seem to be two Wet Legs high-kicking for supremacy: the knockabout, sly, absurdist outfit and a band that turn out to be quite like a lot of other bands.

Even for non-devotees, this is a less challenging listen than might be expected. There’s an abundance of hooks and twisted melodies buried within its pile-up of ideas.

If the songwriting isn’t always the match of the sheen, the best moments here--Panarchy, What You See, Autodrama--are dangerously seductive.

Musically, too, there are tempestuous moments (Missing Children; Sing Me a Song), but the quartet only soar when the lights are dimmed and ambience takes precedence over energy.

While there’s no shortage of dazzling playing from a group that have the intuition of a jazz combo, with odd changes of tempo, and a couple of instrumentals to let rip their bluegrass picking. A curious curate’s egg.

There are flashes of the full-throated musicality that made her an exciting prospect, but the album falls short. Perhaps hampered by a pressure to take her sound in a fresh direction, Balbuena loses the vitality that distinguished her in the first place.

Ultimately, the album is burdened by its own weight, striving to exorcise the group’s creative urges. Perhaps with more time together, Animal Collective could jam into a sense of consistency again.

Over 15 tracks, however, progress stalls. For all Gaika’s articulacy--he also writes for Dazed & Confused--the downbeat haze in which he operates privileges numbness over passion and ire, qualities his arresting music merely hints at, rather than weaponises.